"Vulgar Ethics"

After reading my recent blog post about bridging the gulf between administrative and government ethics, one of the great scholars of public administration, George Frederickson, sent me a copy of a 2009 lecture of his, which appeared in 2010 in the journal Public Integrity. Entitled "Searching for Virtue in the Public Life: Revisiting the Vulgar Ethics Thesis," this lecture introduced me to the term "vulgar ethics," which first appeared in a 1991 essay by Lewis Mainzer. This amazing lecture also presents a great summary of a problem that I have written about a bit, but have not emphasized nearly enough:  the effect on government ethics of growing privatization of government. My next blog post will discuss this problem.

Frederickson quotes at length from Mainzer's essay, which is focused on moral education. Mainzer concluded, "all of us must be uneasy with any supposition that learning philosophy or being able to discuss the pros and cons of a basic issue, leads to virtuous action." Instead of philosophy, Mainzer suggested "vulgar ethics," which Fredrickson describes as "rules, regulations, and red tape … to keep bureaucrats from being bad." In other words, government ethics, except that in government ethics we would say not "being bad" but "acting inappropriately."

Frederickson embraces "vulgar ethics," but sees it primarily as something for those "tempted to be unethical." Most administrators, he feels, will make "moral choices." But when it comes to handling conflict situations, officials often feel that their fiduciary obligations – or from a different point of view, their obligation not to be seen as giving preferential treatment – conflict with their obligation to represent their constituents or do their job. In such instances, the moral choice is often not very clear.

In fact, the choice is not primarily moral at all, but rather professional, just the way an official's choices related to legal and engineering dilemmas are. That is, the right choice is to seek professional advice.

I like the term "vulgar ethics." Although the word "vulgar" is unfortunately used primarily in the negative sense of "uncultivated" or "crude," it really means "of the common people," that is, relating to the citizens whose interests government is intended to serve. It's too bad that this term cannot be embraced by government ethics practitioners. The reason is that its use would be perplexing outside the sort of context in which Frederickson employs it.

Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics

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